The strong arm of the Government in enforcing respect for its just rights in international matters is the Navy of the United States.  I most earnestly recommend that there be no halt in the work of upbuilding the American Navy.  There is no more patriotic duty before us a people than to keep the Navy adequate to the needs of this country’s position.  We have undertaken to build the Isthmian Canal.  We have undertaken to secure for ourselves our just share in the trade of the Orient.  We have undertaken to protect our citizens from proper treatment in foreign lands.  We continue steadily to insist on the application of the Monroe Doctrine to the Western Hemisphere.  Unless our attitude in these and all similar matters is to be a mere boastful sham we can not afford to abandon our naval programme.  Our voice is now potent for peace, and is so potent because we are not afraid of war.  But our protestations upon behalf of peace would neither receive nor deserve the slightest attention if we were impotent to make them good.

The war which now unfortunately rages in the far East has emphasized in striking fashion the new possibilities of naval warfare.  The lessons taught are both strategic and tactical, and are political as well as military.  The experiences of the war have shown in conclusive fashion that while sea-going and sea-keeping torpedo destroyers are indispensable, and fast lightly armed and armored cruisers very useful, yet that the main reliance, the main standby, in any navy worthy the name must be the great battle ships, heavily armored and heavily gunned.  Not a Russian or Japanese battle ship has been sunk by a torpedo boat, or by gunfire, while among the less protected ships, cruiser after cruiser has been destroyed whenever the hostile squadrons have gotten within range of one another’s weapons.  There will always be a large field of usefulness for cruisers, especially of the more formidable type.  We need to increase the number of torpedo-boat destroyers, paying less heed to their having a knot or two extra speed than to their capacity to keep the seas for weeks, and, if necessary, for months at a time.  It is wise to build submarine torpedo boats, as under certain circumstances they might be very useful.  But most of all we need to continue building our fleet of battle ships, or ships so powerfully armed that they can inflict the maximum of damage upon our opponents, and so well protected that they can suffer a severe hammering in return without fatal impairment of their ability to fight and maneuver.  Of course ample means must be provided for enabling the personnel of the Navy to be brought to the highest point of efficiency.  Our great fighting ships and torpedo boats must be ceaselessly trained and maneuvered in squadrons.  The officers and men can only learn their trade thoroughly by ceaseless practice on the high seas.  In the event of war it would be far better to have no ships at all than to have ships of a poor and ineffective type, or ships